


slowly (and then all at once)

by Anomalie



Series: Blade and Quill [1]
Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst and Feels, F/M, Falling In Love, Female Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Fluff and Humor, Fluff and Smut, Found Family, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Masturbation, Slow Burn, Thancred is an emotional disaster, but WoL isn't much better
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-26
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-09-27 05:01:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 16,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20402092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anomalie/pseuds/Anomalie
Summary: Thancred has devoted his life to the only woman he ever loved. It's no wonder he doesn't notice when he starts falling for someone else.A series of chronological oneshots from Thancred's POV covering moments in Shadowbringers and beyond.Chapter 9: Reversal - When Zoeya closes her door behind them, Thancred knows this has been a long time coming.





	1. Water

**Author's Note:**

> In which Thancred sees something he really wishes he hadn't.

Lilies drift on the peaceful, crystalline blue surface of Longmirror Lake. Birds sing. Frogs call. Ripples appear from the deep. There is the scent of aether on the water.

Thancred’s head breaks the surface. He gasps. A young girl – blonde, blue eyed, no more than twelve summers old – follows suit immediately some few yalms away. She coughs violently and splashes. He rotates immediately towards the sound. With the speed and grace of long practice the man swims to her and pulls her torso flat to his with one arm.

“We’re alright. You’re alright Minfilia,” he murmurs, sentiment lost in her next coughing fit. She clutches to his shoulder and trembles as he tows her to shore. More heads emerge – Urianger and Alphinaud, both struggling to keep their heads above water, Alisaie nonplussed between them. She floats, thoroughly unbothered by the waves crashing over her face, one hand gripping each of their collars as they kick up a desperate froth.

“Don’t fight it so much!” she scolds them. “You’re making my job harder. Just lie back and relax.” 

“Easier said than done,” her brother splutters.

“Give it a try, Alphie. Come on.” She shifts her focus to the panicking man opposite him. “Okay, now give me slow, deep breaths. In… out… in… out…” she croons in a vain effort to soothe him. A wildly swinging knee makes contact with her ribs instead.

“OW! That hurt, Urianger!”

He only flails a little less in response.

Back on dry land, Minfilia collapses to her knees, expelling liquid from her lungs in heaving, bark-like coughs. Thancred kneels beside her and rubs her back through the convulsions.

“Gods damn the Fuath,” he mutters under his breath as her fits ease and her breathing slowly returns to a more normal rhythm. He grips her shoulders and pulls her to a sitting position. “We’ll have to work on your swimming. How are you feeling?”

“Better,” the girl wheezes, eyes flitting to Alisaie as she tries and fails to wrangle the two males in her custody. He follows her gaze and immediately spots the disturbance.

“Good. Stay here.”

She nods once in response. Thancred gives her shoulders a squeeze and stands, shucking out of his sopping wet gloves and coat before diving back into the fray.

“Hark! Thancred is coming,” Urianger gasps out as he thrashes.

“Thank heavens,” Alisaie hisses back through gritted teeth, twisting to dodge his flailing appendages. “He can have you. No offense, but you kick like a mule.”

By the time Thancred arrives her hapless charges have all but exhausted themselves. Alisaie pushes Urianger towards him as soon as the man is in arm’s reach. The astrologian bobs under the water once before Thancred grabs the back of his collar and hauls his head above the waves again.

“Hopeless as ever, is he?”

“Worse,” Alisaie grouses as she pulls her brother close. “He lives next to a lake, and he never thought it worthwhile to learn to swim?”

“Too busy drowning himself in useless trivia for that,” Thancred quips as he locks his arms around Urianger’s chest from behind. “You should ask the same of your brother. Hasn’t he spent all his time by the ocean recently?”

“Diplomatic conferences aren’t typically held underwater,” the boy whines as his sister shakes her head and drags him towards shore.

In a matter of minutes the two stronger swimmers tow their limp cargo back to dry land.

“I thank thee,” the astrologian says as he kneels in the shallows and coughs. Minfilia stands up and rushes over to help him while Alphinaud stumbles to his feet. “Perhaps I will consider investigating the aquatic arts.”

“See that you do. Mayhap you three can take lessons together,” Thancred notes absently as he takes a quick head count. “Where is Zoeya?”

They all look at each other.

“We haven’t seen her,” Alisaie states. “She’s not with you?” Minfilia shakes her head wordlessly.

“Urianger. When the Fuath mean to keep someone, please tell me that’s not what I think it means.”

Gold eyes meet amber. “I would be lying if I did my friend.”

“She’s a strong swimmer,” Alisaie supplies hastily. “Nearly as good as I am.”

“That won’t help if she’s knocked out at the bottom of this godsforsaken lake.” Thancred curses under his breath and begins unbuckling his greaves.

“What are you going to do? Just dive in after her?” Alphinaud asks, aghast.

“If I have to.” He pops open another latch.

“I’m sure she’s just washed up somewhere else. We should search the shore for her before we do anything rash.”

“What part of ‘they’re trying to drown her’ did you not understand?!” Thancred snaps back at the boy. “Time is not on our side!”

“No, Thancred,” Alisaie interjects, “You don’t understand – “

He hears faint footsteps rapidly approaching from his six o’clock. He turns toward the sound.

“ – she’s right there.”

So she is.

The Warrior of Darkness is roughly fifty yalms away, sprinting towards them along the lakeshore, splattering mud and muck all around her in her haste as her faerie summon lags behind. She catches his gaze and smiles wide. Zoeya waves with her whole arm and slows gradually to a leisurely walk, spiked tail swinging easily behind her. Eos catches up and bobs contentedly in her wake. _Hale and whole then_, he realizes with relief, as he raises a hand in return.

Unfortunately the feeling doesn’t last. His eyebrows knit as she draws closer. Her hat is gone. Her hose are ripped. She’s missing a glove and half her right sleeve. Her neckline is torn jaggedly from seam to sternum; it drapes halfway open over her chest. She gives him a crooked half-grin when she notices his scrutiny, absently pushing her sopping curls away from her neck. 

Even worse, the iridescent fabric of her dress has gone translucent. Her sodden skirt clings to her thighs. It shimmers beguilingly over her hips with every innocent step towards him. Her breasts swell and pull against the sheer cloth with every breath she takes. A water-dark tendril escapes from behind one horn to drip taunting rivulets over flushed skin and pale scales into the hidden valley between.

She finally stops an arm’s length away.

“Hey,” she greets him, guileless green eyes sparkling in the light. “Looking for me?”

“Absolutely not.”

She blinks at him. Twice.

“Not since you found us instead,” he recovers. “What in the hells happened to you?”

“Zoeya!” Alphinaud exclaims as he pushes between them. “Oh thank heavens. We were worried the Fuath might have claimed you.”

“Oh believe me - they tried,” she replies wryly, gesturing at what remains of her clothing. “Too bad for them I can’t drown.”

“That’s what I was trying to tell you,” Allisaie huffs at him while Eos flutters anxiously and makes a beeline for Urianger.

The twins huddle around her. Thancred tears his eyes away. Information on the Kojin and Soroban’s blessing filters into his mind through a distracted haze as he turns to help his elven friend to his feet. Zoeya doesn’t notice in the slightest, happy to help as always, teaching Alphinaud and Alisaie a quick-dry charm that they cast on others in turn. She even offers Minfilia private swimming lessons when both Urianger and Alphinaud vehemently decline. He goes through the motions as the group gathers their washed-up belongings from the beach, deliberately choosing to search as far from her as possible.

They return to the Bookman’s Shelves to rest and regroup. Urianger cooks. Thancred eats half his meal and tastes none of it. He begs off after dinner, ignoring his friend’s concerned frown, citing exhaustion and a need for solitude. When his bedroom door locks behind him he releases a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding.

“Fuck.”

He’s honestly baffled. He hasn’t burned like this since his Studium days. He and Zoeya have no prior history as anything beyond colleagues - she’s never so much as batted her eyelashes at him, for crying out loud. He knows it’s been literal years since he’s had anyone in his bed, but this is verging on the ridiculous.

He must truly be desperate if one ripped (_translucent, sopping wet_) dress has his baser instincts reacting as if she were desire personified. Even now his traitorous cock twitches as her laughter echoes down the hall from the library. Her very existence is fraying his nerves. How little it would take to just wait until the children are asleep, to slip out his door and knock on hers…

_This blasted place does things to people. It’s just a physical response. It’s nothing personal_, he tells himself like a mantra as he strips out of his armor to his underclothes and takes himself in hand.

In his mind’s eye he replays those moments. The shape of her breasts above her soaked leather corset; the translucence of taut fabric over rosy nipples, pert from the chill; the dark patch barely concealed by sheer cloth between her thighs; that smile, those eyes…

_Looking for me?_

He stumbles to the bed and supports his weight with one hand on the mattress as his imagination takes flight. He sees her fall to her knees before him, reach for him, grasp him, gaze up at him with half-lidded sea green irises as she pulls his head into her moist, pink mouth –

“Gods,” he whispers under his breath –

He sees her close her eyes and open wide, swallowing him as far as she can go, hears her keen around his cock as he fists a hand into the sopping wet hair at her crown; sees her eager mouth move around him, dress dripping puddles onto the floor, lashes dark against flushed cheeks as she works him, moaning in pleasure as he thrusts deep into her throat –

“Gods damn it,” he curses as he fumbles for the rag in his nightstand –

licking and sucking and looking up at him and begging him, _please, oh please, come for me_ –

_She never has to know._

He groans, rag at the ready, moving it to cover his head just in time. It’s messy. Cum spills down his shaft and leaks between his fingers before he can catch it all. He pants harshly, head bowed and shoulders lax as he wipes the warm remains of his own seed off his thighs. Then he tosses the unlucky cloth into the wastebasket and falls bonelessly onto the bed.

He’s perversely grateful he didn’t knock on Zoeya’s door after all. Even beyond the part where she might have told him to take a long walk off a short pier, to finish so soon… honestly, he’s vaguely appalled. “Oh, how the mighty have fallen,” he muses to no one in particular.

He truly does feel better. His head is clearer. Minfilia is safe with Urianger and the Warrior of Darkness under the same roof, and there are no pressing threats to occupy his thoughts. His muscles are lax and his eyes flutter shut as the cool air soothes his bare skin. He hasn’t slept without armor on in ages, he realizes. Perhaps at least a good night’s rest will come of all this.

Tomorrow they’ll climb the mountain to entreat the Nu Mou for aid and he’ll forget this embarrassing little interlude ever happened. Satisfied with this plan of inaction, he crawls under the covers and falls into a dreamless sleep.

In the morning she is wearing a new tunic; something black with frilled sleeves, a thick leather capelet and a high collar covered by the most ostentatious doily he’s ever seen. She claims she found it yesterday with a pair of black trousers and a grimoire in Dohn Mheg.

He’s far more relieved than he’d like to admit.


	2. Warmth

Thancred decided he liked Slitherbough at night.

Oppressive jungle heat and cloying humidity notwithstanding, Slitherbough’s gentle people live a life he can appreciate. Take only what you must from the land; repay each kindness with another; treat all Blessed as if they were your own kin, and they will do so in return. It’s a quiet sort of existence he never thought he’d want as the wine-soaked wharf rat who used to carouse and chase skirts until the wee hours of the morning. Yet the longer he spends here - watching parents lift their laughing children onto their shoulders so they might be that much closer to the sunless sea - some part of him could see the appeal.

If Y’shtola had her way they would’ve been on the road by now. Unfortunately armies can’t march on recklessness and zeal, and neither could the Scions. Minfilia was barely upright; Urianger was dragging his feet; even Zoeya was uncharacteristically quiet and withdrawn.

“I agree that there should be no feast - we’re not worth that kind of reverence. But could we stay the night at least? Rest before we go?” Zoeya pleaded.

“You must all be hungry and exhausted,” Runar agreed. Then, voice low and eyes soft for the silver-haired woman alone, “It’s just one night. Is it truly too much to ask?”

Y’shtola hesitated. She beheld Runar with a speaking look that gave Thancred the distinct impression he’d witnessed part of a private conversation. She sighed softly. “I suppose just one couldn’t hurt.”

The naked love and joy on Runar’s face almost blinded him.

Y’shtola retired to her quarters after making the rounds and ensuring all her people were well recovered from the Eulmoran attack and the Children's poison. No one was surprised when Runar knocked on her door shortly afterwards. Thancred imagined they must have much and more to talk (and not talk) about. So now here he was, sitting around the cookfire, quietly eating a bowl of stew and watching the Night’s Blessed revel in the darkness. They chanted, sang, and danced under the stars, lifting their arms and stamping their feet in celebration. Minfilia perked up some once she had a full belly; she sat on the ground a few fulms to his left and watched the festivities with interest.

“I wish I could braid my hair like that,” the girl sighed as she watched a grey-skinned Drahn woman with a crownlike plait spin her laughing child in the firelight.

Zoeya sat on a log some few yalms away and hummed. “It is rather difficult to do that by yourself. I could help you, if you want.”

Minfilia turned towards her voice. “You can do that?”

Zoeya snorted and raised an eyebrow. “I had to do my little sisters’ hair every morning. I could probably do that” – she tipped her chin at the Blessed woman – “in my sleep.”

Minfilia looked to Thancred. “May I?”

He blinked, half surprised and half gratified. “I don’t see why not.”

The child clapped her hands once in happiness. Zoeya smiled fondly and patted her thigh.

“Come over here then, honey. It’ll be easier if you sit between my knees.”

Minfilia stood up and did as she was bid. When she’d settled on the ground between Zoeya’s feet, Zoeya untied her pink ribbon and started combing through golden locks with practiced fingers.

“I didn’t know you had any sisters,” she said shyly.

“Two, actually. And a brother. All younger.”

“The oldest of four? Really?” he interjected.

“Yes, really.”

“Suddenly I understand where your seemingly inexhaustible patience comes from.”

She stuck her tongue out at him in response.

“What is it like?”

“Braiding someone else’s hair? It takes a little practice,” the woman mused as she gently untangled a knot, “but you’ll get it in no time. Just have to think a few steps ahead.”

“No, I mean… having sisters.”

Zoeya opened her mouth, then closed it. She looked up at him briefly before her eyes flitted back to the girl at her feet. She smiled ruefully at the back of Minfilia’s head. “It’s… complicated,” she murmured as she split the flaxen strands above the girl’s left ear into three sections and tied the ribbon into one.

“Do they fight a lot? Like Alisaie and Alphinaud?”

Zoeya snickered. “Of course! Over anything and everything. I was always mediating some stupid argument for Aliyah or Samira. If it wasn’t who did what chores, it was who ate the last fig or whether someone stole something. Aliyah used to steal my shoes all the time.”

“How did you know?”

“Besides seeing her wear them?” Zoeya snarked before her face turned dark. “Sometimes she thought she could be sneaky and put them back where she found them, but her feet are flat as boards. I always knew the _second_ I put them on because she’d smashed all the arch support out.”

Minfilia giggled. Zoeya grinned fondly at the top of Minfilia’s head her as she wove the plait across her hairline to the right.

“Did they ever braid your hair too?”

“Samira did, sometimes. She’s the youngest. I used to let her practice on me when Aliyah wouldn’t be caught dead in her handiwork.”

“What about your brother?”

“He kept his hair short so we wouldn’t have a reason to harass him.”

“Smart kid,” Thancred quipped.

“Oh? That’s rich, coming from you,” Zoeya teased back. “Did you know he used to have long hair?”

“Thancred did?”

“Mmm hmm. He was so vain about it. Had bangs down to his chin and a long tail in the back.”

“But he always has me cut it when it gets in his eyes…”

The two prattled on like that, about everything and nothing, as Zoeya worked dexterous fingers through Minfilia’s silken locks. The firelight danced over her lips as they laughed. Her wine-red curls shone in the firelight’s glow, eyes bright and cheeks rosy when she glanced up from her work to smile at him.

Something settled deep in his gut; something primal and instinctive Thancred couldn’t place and didn’t want to name. He had neither Alphinaud’s gift for the arts nor the inclination, but that same something made him wish, for a moment, that he did.

“There,” Zoeya said proudly as she tucked the loose ends into the beginning of the plait. “All done.”

Minfilia gingerly reached up to pat her hair. “Are you sure it will stay?”

“At least for tonight - it won’t stay much longer without pins. The ribbon should help though.”

The girl looked up and smiled. “Thank you.”

Zoeya gazed tenderly down at her before she wrapped her arms around her shoulders and squeezed. “Anytime.”

Minfilia returned the hug before she stood up and dusted off her dress. Then she took a few steps towards him and spun in a shy little circle. “What do you think?”

He nodded. “Very nice.”

“Shouldn’t you go show Urianger?” Zoeya suggested. “I think he said he’d be stargazing outside the village.”

“Can I?” she asked him.

“Go ahead. Just don’t go far.”

Soon they were alone, sitting around dying coals while the celebrations went on without them. She caught his eye and strolled over, settling on the ground beside him with her arms around her shins.

“That was kind of you,” he murmured.

“It was my pleasure,” she sighed contentedly, turning her head to lean the flat of a finlike horn against her knees. "I hadn't realized how much I'd missed it."

The two of them sat in companionable silence for a while before she bumped his shoulder with hers. “She’s a great kid. You should be proud.”

“Mmm.”

“Just... open up to her a little more. She needs more reassurance than you realize. And don’t forget to tell your girl she’s pretty.”

“Didn’t I just say she looked nice?”

“Come on, Thancred, I know you can do better than that,” she goaded and rolled her eyes.

So he leaned in close, caught her gaze with his own and whispered, “She is. _Very_ pretty.”

She went very, very still. He let the silence hang between them for a few moments. Her cheeks and neck began to flush red under his unrelenting regard. Her mouth dropped open a fraction; he could feel the warmth of her breath as she exhaled.

Then he stood up, unhurried and unbothered, and smirked down at her. “Goodnight, Zoeya.”

“Goodnight,” she echoed faintly as he walked away into the dark.


	3. Defenses

Zoeya likes to touch.

Often she will forgo speaking if contact can suffice. It’s something Thancred completely forgot about her after five years away from the Source. He’d been truly startled when she casually grabbed him during the pixie’s games to point out a patch of looking grass. He’d had to reel in certain… other instincts on the way back to the Crystarium when she leaned over his shoulder to watch him maintain his weapon. He’d been forced to bite his tongue when she innocently asked what the oil was for.

Thancred always learned best by observation, and by the time they reach Fanow he understands that her tactile predisposition is an extension of how she interacts with the world. She prefers grimoires with textured spines and codexes with thick pages; she always has mending or a drop spindle on hand for quiet moments by the fire. She explores new things with gentle fingers and asks precise questions to supplement her findings. Alphinaud and Urianger spent hours once by the fire theorizing how the azure blooms of Yx’Maya maintain their luminescence. Zoeya simply picked a few, dissected one, and sketched an entry in her botanist’s log before gingerly pressing a posy of glowing petals between the pages.

Six weeks of guileless disregard for his personal space eventually dulled his primal alertness into an easy and simple comraderie. At some point Thancred started learning the smaller nuances of her body language like a second tongue. She rolls her shoulders when she avoids a question; small, repetitive movements with no purpose betray a busy mind. A tap on his shoulder asks for his attention. A loose grip above his elbow says she’s interested in what he’s doing. A tug on his sleeve says she’s concerned or wants his opinion on something she found. He has even begun looking forward to sleepy smiles and the glide of her palm down his arm each day in lieu of _good morning_ before they break camp.

Which is precisely why he knows something is bothering her.

She’s quieter than usual as they pack up to leave Slitherbough. She is polite and cordial when spoken to, but otherwise stares somewhere into the middle distance and lets her breakfast go cold. Normally she goes out of her way to touch base with everyone and be sure they’re ready to go – Alisaie even called her a mother hen when they'd bedded down with the amaro, and she’d laughed before owning the moniker. Today, however, she lags behind, shoving things into her pack last minute and tripping over a root outside the village gate.

“Shiiit shit shit,” she curses under her breath as she hops agitatedly on one foot.

He casually slows his pace to trail at the back of the group and waits. “Everything alright?”

“I’m fine, it’s fine,” she grumbles as Selene casts a quick Embrace. She reaches up and pats the summon on the cheek in thanks.

“You’ve been distracted all morning.”

“What? Me? No.”

He raises an eyebrow.

“Okay. Maybe a little bit. I’ll pay more attention, I promise.”

His expression must convey his skepticism because she flushes and looks away. “I just didn’t sleep well. Don’t worry, I am definitely awake now.”

“Come on then. Let’s not fall too far behind.”

She sighs and lifts her skirts, dark laces of her new healer’s dress shifting across her bared midriff. “I know, I know. I’m coming.”

He sticks his hands in his pockets and they stroll together in comfortable silence. Thancred can see Minfilia with Urianger and Y’shtola about twenty yalms ahead; she looks back at him curiously before mentioning something to the Elezen. He takes a glimpse of the two of them and shakes his head, continuing on down the path.

“Hey.”

He glances at the woman next to him, idly braiding wine-red curls over her shoulder. She ties the braid off with a strip of leather and adjusts her pack. She’s gripping the straps and running her thumbs back and forth over them in an absent self-soothing motion.

“Yes?” he supplies.

“Last night, did you…” she stops herself and rubs the scaled vee on her forehead. “You know what? Nevermind. It’s not important.”

“It must be if it kept you up all night.”

“Just...” she rolls her shoulders and looks out at the swamp around them. “Bad dreams, is all.”

He nods and takes a few more steps. “It’s hard to help you if you lie.”

She flinches.

He doesn’t press her further; simply ambles next to her at the same leisurely pace, scanning their surroundings periodically for any threats lying in wait. The local wildlife seems to have made itself scarce, likely confused and disoriented by the weak light of true morning.

“What would you do,” she tries again, “If someone you trusted thought you could be a danger to yourself and others, and didn’t tell you?”

“Depends on who it was,” he answers evenly. “Most don’t know what they’re talking about.”

“What if that person was Y’shtola?”

When he glanced down again her anxiety is writ plain in the arms crossed defensively over her chest.

“I overheard her talking to Urianger. She said my aether is corrupted - that I’ve been absorbing the light instead of dispersing it. She thinks it’s a real possibility I could turn.”

He takes a minute to process this information.

“And when was this?”

“A week ago.”

“What about yesterday? After you quelled Eros?”

“Nothing, but she’s been avoiding me ever since. She won’t face me straight on. It’s almost like… I’m a lamp too bright for her to look at.”

“Do you feel any differently than normal? Is that why you couldn’t sleep last night?”

She looks away for a moment before she makes eye contact again. “No.”

He gives her a pointed look.

“No really! physically I feel fine,” she adds hastily. “I haven’t noticed any changes. But now I’ve absorbed three Lightwardens, and Y’shtola is so rarely wrong about what she sees…” she trails off and drops her eyes to the muddied path before her.

Thancred sighs. Whatever it is, it’s not the whole truth, but he doesn’t think it’s worth it to pry further. Her shoulders are bowed and eyes shadowed; the worries she has shared weigh heavy, but there is little he can do to lighten a burden only she can carry.

He has never been good with things like this. If their positions were reversed, he imagines she’d have held his hand. She’d done it once before; a simple overture of comfort after their Minfilia became Word of the Mother so long ago. One that he’d spurned immediately, too distraught and lost in self-flagellation to accept solace from the woman who couldn’t save her either.

He reaches out.

She stops in her tracks and looks up in surprise when his palm finds the back of her left arm. He closes his fingers around scales and skin what he hopes is a reassuring hold. She turns to him and gazes into his eyes expectantly. He searches for the right thing to say.

“I don’t know why Y’shtola has kept her counsel; she usually has a good reason after the fact. But the blessing of Light hasn’t failed you yet. We have time. We will figure this out.”

She shakes her head. “I’ve seen the transformation, Thancred. It’s horrible and painful and I can still hear her screams in my nightmares. What if one day I can't contain it? What if I truly begin to turn?”

“Then we will find a way to keep that from happening. Even the infected have some time before the end comes. This much I can promise you,” he intones solemnly, “I will _never_ let you become an Eater.”

All is quiet and still for a moment. Then she lays her hand over his and smiles, somehow sad and grateful and fond at the same time.

“I hope you never have to keep that promise.” She twines their fingers as her voice falls soft.

“Thank you, Thancred. I’m glad to have you at my back.”

Her eyes are green like the sea.

“Oh, well isn’t this touching? Even the legendary hero is plagued by doubt. Points for self-awareness, my dear - most of you self-sacrificing types like to ignore their limits.”

A cloud of dark aether pools beside them; Emet-Selch prowls out of the shadows, insouciant and irreverent and infuriating as always. He affects a shocked expression and raises an eyebrow at Thancred’s stony glare.

“Oh, have I come at a bad time? It looks like you two were in the middle of something.”

“In the middle of getting on with our day, more like.” Thancred drops his hand. “Shall we?”

Zoeya sighs and shrugs helplessly. She fixes the Ascian with an annoyed stare. “Good morning to you too, Emet.”

“That’s Emet-Selch to you, hero. Now chop-chop. Places to be, wardens to vanquish and all that.” He side-eyes them as he passes by and waves lazily over his shoulder.

The two of them follow reluctantly in his wake. Thancred curses himself for not keeping his defenses up as they make their way out of Rak’tika.

He ignores the part of his brain that points out they must have fallen first.


	4. Catharsis

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Real is real  
And what you do  
means nothing
> 
> if you do not understand  
why you do  
the things you have  
done,
> 
> and what you  
have given up  
and lost
> 
> for a chance to love.
> 
> \- What We Do, Robert M. Drake

Sand.

Sand, sand, and more fucking sand. Sand blasting in his face, his hair, his nose. Sand grinding beneath his greaves, his sleeves, his collar. Sand creeping behind his body armor and into the crack of his ass. Sand in his food and drink, turning every meager meal into an exercise in swallowing grit. Sand in his throat, in his eyes, on his tongue when he lays one hand on a bowed golden head and walks away from the defeated and the dead.

He hates this place.

For now, he’s managed to find shelter from the unrelenting wind behind a broken and battered outbuilding on the edge of town. A pitiful awning provides a flat square of shade. He sits heavily on the desiccated wooden bench beneath it. The planks groan beneath his weight. Thancred unslings his gunblade and slowly unwinds the coarse fabric loosely tied over the barrel. He checks the cylinder for live bullets – none - and pulls his cleaning kit from the pocket inside his jacket. A pouch of inert ammunition follows.

He hasn’t seen that damned Ascian since they left the Forest of the Lost Shepherd behind; at least the punishing Light this close to the Wall is good for something.

He wipes his hands clean as best he can and pulls a pristine cloth out of the kit to lay across his thighs. The rest his body does by rote: sliding a spare sock over the cylinder, choosing the right bristle brushes and solvents, slipping the brushes up the barrel and following the rifling as it twists to the left.

His Minfilia is dead. She has been dead for three years, six years, a hundred; she is a ghost, a phantom, a spirit, compelled by her Blessing to die again and again and again to hold the line. Logically, he knows this. He heard the soul-deep exhaustion in her voice the only day she ever spoke. He heard her pain and sadness and pity. He heard her refusal to create another revenant in this war that has waged for a century, for lifetimes, for eons.

He puts away his brushes and pulls out a thin rod instead. The soaked felt attached to the end comes out of the muzzle black. He throws the ruined cloth away and begins again with a new one.

Three years ago, he dreamed of her every night. He dreamed of a child crying over her father’s broken body; of a girl with a pickaxe and a gentle smile; of a woman with gravitas and responsibilities who laughed at his stupid jokes. He dreamed of dark tunnels, fear, and grief, of dashed hopes on astral planes and broken goodbyes. He dreamed of all the ways he would change himself, redeem himself, prove himself worthy of her this time for once.

The sodden patch comes out grey this time. He removes it, adds another, and lets his wrist rotate as the rod slips in.

The Minfilia he saved was not what he expected: a true blank slate with no life skills to speak of, no recognition, no memories. Ever since he has fed her, clothed her, sheltered her, taught her how to hold a blade and not cry when he came back from hunting with a kill slung over his shoulders. He told her bedtime stories of their friends, their world, their adventures. He thought if he could just jog her memory – if he could remind her of who she really was, of who she had been, of what he had been through - he could get the woman he… the woman who lead the Scions back.

He thought.

This time the patch is white. He puts the rod away.

The Minfilia he raised is resourceful. Determined. Selfless. Intelligent. Clever. Too clever for her own good, sometimes, as played out when she snuck off to find Zoeya on her own. (His heart had nearly stopped when he rose to shake her awake and found a pack covered in blankets instead.) She loves reading and flowers and if she keeps growing like a weed she’ll start straining his budget to the breaking point. She needs a new dress and shoes already; how she copes with the toes cut out of her boots he has no idea, but she keeps insisting it’s fine until they can get enough funds for ones that fit. Her room at the Bookman’s Shelves is plastered with drawings – of the fae, of Il Mheg, of Urianger with a tome upon his lap - but the portrait with pride of place over her dresser is a detailed sketch of himself, sitting upon a stone and casually oiling his weapon next to a permanently scandalized leafman.

And now...

The hydrocarbon solvent fumes are making him feel nauseous. He tips a small amount onto a clean rag and screws the cap on tight before setting it aside. He pulls the sock off the cylinder and begins rubbing each chamber down with the dampened rag.

The shuffle of light footsteps echoes around the corner.

He knows her tread like breathing, now, so he doesn’t bother to look up when she quietly approaches from his right. She stops at the far edge of the bench. He focuses on removing the central extractor rod and wiping the rear cylinder clean.

The air changes; a small breeze swells into a gust, rolling his brushes across the ancient plank and kicking up dust –

“Titan. Place. Stay.”

A floating shadow passes over him. He can hear the susurrus of thousands of grains pelting a rocky body as it interrupts the fickle wind. Aetherial stone washes his disassembled gunblade in a subtle golden glow. Zoeya picks up his bristle brushes and carefully slots them into his kit, leaving out the bore brush and rod and gently placing them at the edge of his field of vision.

“Thank you,” he murmurs.

“Anytime.”

She tests the integrity of the wood with a push once, twice, then gingerly sits an arm’s length away. He sets his weapon down across his lap and begins doling out small cloth squares in six sets of three.

“Everything in working order?”

“So far.”

“How are you doing on ammo?”

He shrugs. “I can do without.”

She lets out a frustrated sigh. Then she reaches for his cartridge pouch and puts it in her lap.

That definitely gets his attention. He watches as she looses the drawstring and pulls out a single round. She rolls it between her fingers, examining the rim with a careful eye.

“These aren’t too different than the bullets Stephanivien gave me. Larger caliber, definitely,” she muses before she runs her thumb over the flat end.

“Who?”

“Stephanivien de Haillenarte. He runs the Skysteel Manufactory in Ishgard.”

Thancred nods in recognition. “There are a host of rifle schematics with his name on it in the Cabinet. Donated by the Exarch, most likely.”

“Sounds about right.” She looks at him quizzically for a second. Then she looks down at his blade and back up at him. “He didn’t design that, did he?”

“No. I did.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“I didn’t know you were a machinist.”

She shakes her head. “I’m not. Tried it out for a day, decided I didn’t like the recoil.”

He shrugs again. Thancred points the muzzle of his gunblade off his knee and pours a bit of solvent in each chamber, running the bore brush through each one as the oil drains onto the sand.

“So… how does the bullet hold a charge?”

“Aethersand in the propellant. Pin glows blue when primed.”

She hums thoughtfully. “Must be a delicate balance, priming the powder without blowing it.”

The wind dies down. His stomach settles. He cleans each cylinder as he did the barrel, soaking cloths in solvent and then running dry patches through with the rod, lost in his own thoughts and the steady rhythm of a familiar routine in familiar company. He wipes down every metallic surface with gun oil and turns to pull a dry rag from his kit.

The rag he needs is spread out already on the bench seat between them. A row of four cartridges points towards her. Their pins flicker various shades of blue.

“Zoeya.”

“Hold on a sec,” she mutters, biting her lip in concentration. The fifth round is secure in her right fist. Trace amounts of aether emerge in hair-thin wisps from her open left palm. They hover over the flat end of the bullet, feeding into the central silver circle until it glows. Then she severs the connection and hands him the latest specimen with an apologetic smile.

“Well? How’d I do?”

A gentle breeze ruffles his hair. He feels like he should want to be angry, but the fury never comes.

Instead he deliberately rearranges the ammunition on the rag, turning each cartridge ninety degrees. He taps the first one. “Too much.” The second. “Not enough.” The third, fourth and fifth. “Better, but not quite there.”

“How so?”

“Too much aether in the pin, not enough in the powder. You can tell by the way their luster fades. Think of it like a conduit between you and the sand instead of a status indicator.”

“They’re fading because the aether is leaching out.”

“Correct.”

“That’s why you constantly have her making more – they only last for so long.”

“Correct again. Even a sufficiently imbued cartridge only holds its charge for forty-eight hours, and that’s not including the ammunition I spend.”

“Hmmm.” She taps each bullet in turn. “Are any of these usable?”

“I’m afraid not. But they’re not bad for your first try.”

She snorts. “Way to damn me with faint praise.”

Then she smiles at him, and he can’t stop his mouth from turning up at the edges in return. Her lashes brush her cheeks when she blinks slowly against the wind; loose spiral tendrils float across her lips. Moments pass.

“Thancred?” she whispers.

“Yes?”

Then she suddenly shakes her head, drops her gaze, and clasps her hands. “When will you talk to Minfilia?”

He packs up his kit. She sighs heavily.

“Look - I know why. The Echo showed me back in Il Mheg.”

He drops each cartridge one by one into the pouch on her lap and takes it from her, cinching the twine drawstring closed.

“She just… she told me some things. Things you should hear, in person, from her, before she goes to the Wall.” Zoeya takes a deep breath. “But I didn’t come here to force you.”

He slips the kit and pouch back into his jacket pocket. “Why are you here, then?”

“Because I love them too.”

He looks up at the plural. She meets his gaze and gently grips his right hand with both of hers.

“Whatever decision she makes, we’ll both have to live with it. You don’t have to go through this alone.” Zoeya squeezes his callused digits between her smaller, softer ones.

“I meant it when I told you I was glad to have you at my back. I hope, this time, you might let me stand at yours.”

He simply stares at their joined hands. Thancred slowly shakes his head.

“How can you say something so trite with a straight face?”

“It’s a gift.”

He huffs in response.

They sit quietly like that for a few minutes; then he hesitantly covers the back of her right hand with his left palm.

“We need leonine. The Talos can’t run without it.”

She cocks her head at him. “I mean, yeah, but local intel says the mines ran dry ages ago.”

“Then we start with the last known vein. There is more somewhere in this godsforsaken desert - there _must_ be more.”

“Okay. We’ll just have to find out where that is.”

She releases him and stands. “Titan. Heel,” she commands, and the sound of stone grating against stone circles around them to meet her. “Ready?”

Thancred nods. “As I’ll ever be.”

He slings his weapon over his shoulder and follows her into the Light.

*~*

When he speaks to her of the woman they both knew, he says _our Minfilia_, and it feels right.

Zoeya laughs at the idea of Minfilia calling him a ‘wine-sodden wharf rat’. He rather likes the sound of it.

*~*

This is how it ends.

He’d always known he would die violently. Life had seldom been kind to him; he expected even less from Death, but the utter agony of standing on broken legs and breathing through punctured lungs is a particularly cruel twist. A quick knife in the heart or a stab to the kidney would have more than sufficed.

Ranjit retreats. He is sure he said something profound but he can’t remember it through the pain.

Thancred collapses to his knees. His attempt to get up ends with falling backwards to the unforgiving gravel; the impact of his own weight from standing height shatters one more fractured rib. He coughs up blood and sputum, the spasms forcing shards of his own bones further into his mutilated organs.

Time, he reminds himself. He traded his life for time.

He can only pray it is enough.

His last thoughts are of her; the beautiful, selfless, courageous woman he once knew, the one he knows he will never see again. The Minfilia he raised has made her choice. She has Zoeya, and Urianger, and all the rest of the Scions to love and care for her when he passes from this world. He wishes he had listened to Zoeya’s advice sooner; there are far too many things he left unsaid.

But this moment is for the dead. He sees her in his mind’s eye, all long golden braids and pink ribbons in her hair, and he only feels gratitude for the privilege of knowing her at all.

He lays a hand across his eyes; it would be nice, to die in the shade.

“Oh Minfilia,” he whispers. “I should have told you how much I loved you.”

His consciousness drifts. His eyes slip closed. He is glad, at least, that he can begin his eternal rest at peace.

He never expects to wake up.

*~*

“Ryne,” she breathes. “Yes, I rather like the sound of it.”

She is brilliant, his little girl, his blessing; all strawberry blond hair and watery grey eyes, joyful tears running down her cheeks as she utters her given name for the first time.

He swears to himself, in this moment, that she will never have cause to doubt his regard ever again.

They move out for Malikah’s Well. Zoeya confers with Alphinaud and Urianger, firing away in rapid technical language and pointed medical inquiries before they can adequately assure her he is healed enough to fight. She crosses her arms and sighs, slowing her pace to fall in step with him at the back of the group. She tugs on his sleeve and pulls him to a stop.

“Zoeya. I’m fine, I promise you.”

“You almost died. If you insist on tanking the Well, I’m assigning Eos to Aetherpact you the entire time. Are we clear?”

There’s so much tumult circling in her eyes; he is touched, really, that she has come to care so much for his well-being.

“Thank you,” he murmurs, “for having my back.”

Her expression softens. She reaches up and runs her thumb along the clotted cut under his right eye, white magic knitting his skin closed in its wake.

“Anytime.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> follow me on tumblr! https://anomaliewrites.tumblr.com/


	5. Denial

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Thancred and Y'shtola have a talk.

Daily life in Amity is absolute bedlam.

The modest Kholusian village is utterly overrun. Miners, Eulmoran nobles, craftsmen from the Crystalline Mean and Night’s Blessed tribesmen outnumber the locals fifty to one. The Chais have set up camp in the center of town at the mayor’s behest; the increased foot traffic has been driving sales at the tavern through the roof, with more people and supplies shipped up the Ladder every day. Urianger has been assisting in the complex aether calculations required for a mountain-sized Talos, while Y’shtola and the Blessed have been hunting and gathering enough food for the host spread out across the Scree. Alphinaud has put himself to work in Eulmore, facilitating the political transition from bloated dictatorship to a somewhat functional city-state, while Alisaie has been off doing… gods know what, honestly. Probably something involving stabbing things.

He and Ryne have been somewhat at a loss. They’ve helped with plenty of odd jobs, but nothing in particular needs their skill sets at the moment. Zoeya, on the other hand, seems to be needed everywhere at once. She has been constantly sprinting back and forth, hailed by one faction then another, asked to lift spirits or mediate disputes or one of countless other menial tasks.

It doesn’t take long to see it’s running her ragged. Zoeya has a borrowed bed in the mayor’s residence, but the covers are rarely turned down, if at all, and the town’s temporary residents are not in the least shy about banging on her door. He wouldn’t be so concerned if she didn’t look so awful. She had hardly spoken three words to him in as many days when he caught her tripping down the tavern steps with purple bags under her eyes.

So, Thancred assigns himself a job.

Every time Zoeya stumbles or mumbles or needs to bathe, Thancred is there to escort her to bed and guard the door. Ryne paints a red ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign they hang on the outside of the knob. She locks the door assists Zoeya in some basic self-care while Thancred leans menacingly on the wall outside. Even wearing his most intimidating scowl, there is inevitably some poor sinner who just begs him to speak with the Warrior of Darkness.

After the tenth such visitor in the first hour, Thancred stops being polite.

Eventually an enterprising noble realizes all he allows past him are buckets of bathwater and rations. The cunning bastard begins sending his Mystel servant bearing gourmet dishes. Thancred’s first instinct is to turn him away, but the moment the noble’s valet uncovers a plate of risotto al Nero the door swings open of its own accord.

“For you, madam,” the retainer intones, bowing deeply. “Rae-Lewq, at your service.”

Zoeya blinks and inhales. “That smells _really_ good.”

“When was the last time you ate?” Thancred asks.

She cocks her head to the side and thinks about it.

“Alright. Too long, obviously.” He narrows his eyes at the green-haired man before them. “I swear, if that rice is poisoned - ”

“Thank you very much,” Zoeya intones evenly as she glares at Thancred, takes the proffered dish and shuts the door in his face.

Rae-Lewq arrives with new cuisine every day, after that. Thancred allows it. The way her face lights up every time she samples a new flavor makes his tedious vigil worth it.

*~*

One week into his new routine, Thancred’s reputation has begun speaking for itself. A local offered him a stool after the first two days; he sits on it now while people give him a wide berth, red warning sign prominently displayed as Zoeya slumbers inside.

“How is she doing?” Y’shtola asks, approaching from his left.

“Better. Regular meals and sleep are great for that.”

“I’m sure. She certainly seems less unstable lately.”

“Unstable?” he repeats.

“It’s nothing,” she demurs before changing the subject. “I need to speak with you.”

“Then speak.”

“Not here.” She shifts uncomfortably. “Perhaps… somewhere more private?”

“What on earth could be so important you need to drag me out of town?”

“Humor me, Thancred. It will only take a moment.”

She shifts again, and it’s only because she’s so discomfited that he finally sighs and stands. “This had better be good, Y’shtola.”

She walks him north towards the mountains, just far enough that they’re easily seen but not heard.

“Are we suitably isolated now?” he scowls, crossing his arms across his chest. “Whatever you came to say, just say it.”

Y’shtola puts her hands on her hips and looks purposefully into the middle distance. Her ears flick back and forth.

“I owe you an apology.”

Well.

He looks carefully for a tell or a tick, something to betray such a genuine statement; but instead she looks up and meets his eyes with her cataract-obscured gaze. Thancred uncrosses his arms and mirrors her posture.

“You have my attention.”

She flattens her ears a bit, the closest to a true sign of contrition as he’s ever seen from her. “What I said to you in Slitherbough, in front of Min- in front of Ryne.” Y’shtola sighs. “I was frustrated, and it was inappropriate. I apologize.”

“Apology accepted,” he replies, pleasantly surprised. “Though in all fairness, I can’t say you were wrong.”

“Someone made me realize recently that it’s not about being right or wrong. It’s about the intent to wound behind the action.”

He raises an eyebrow. That sounds suspiciously like a something a certain empathetic Ronso might say.

She takes a deep breath. “I have high expectations for the people closest to me, and I become agitated when they are not met how I expect. I will endeavor to be less judgmental in the future.”

“You sound as if you just chewed a mouthful of glass.”

She gives him a scathing look followed by a small, self-deprecating smile. He returns it and shakes his head.

“I am far from perfect either, Shtola. Don’t worry yourself on my account.”

Her ears flick forward at the familiar appellation; something he hasn’t used for many years, since their days skipping seminars to fumble in secret alcoves and slipping into narrow supply closets between classes.

“It sounds like this someone might be good for you,” he offers.

“Perhaps,” she replies noncommittally, but the warmth in her tone says otherwise.

“Is there anything else you’d like to apologize for?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

“Pity.” He shrugs. “Couldn’t pass up the opportunity.”

She grins and crosses her arms. “You seem.. happier, of late.”

“Compared to what? Abject misery?”

“Well, yes,” she answers sardonically, “but I meant on a more fundamental level.”

He looks away for a moment. “Things are… not as difficult as they used to be.”

“I noticed. You’re less self-absorbed, for one.”

His lips twitch up at the corners. “Perhaps we are both changing for the better.”

Y’shtola hums thoughtfully in response. Her gaze leaves his to follow something behind him; he pivots to find Zoeya up and about again, deep circles under her eyes as she follows yet another petitioner to Amity’s clapboard tavern.

“Excuse me while I teach another idiot the meaning of ‘Do Not Disturb’,” he grumbles menacingly, stalking away to follow.

“Thancred.”

He pauses and turns his face over his shoulder. Y’shtola taps her fist slowly against her chin, drawing the moment out before she speaks.

“Don’t start something if you cannot finish it.”

“Meaning what, exactly?”

Her expression is so utterly disappointed it stings.

“Spit it out,” he snaps, suddenly off-balance.

“I may be blind,” she muses, “but even I can see the way you look at her.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Furthermore, I can see the way she looks at you - and she _never_ looks at _anyone_. Not for as long as I’ve known her.”

“It’s not like that and you know it.”

“Oh? Did I say a name?” She puts one hand on her hip. “Who could possibly inspire such vehement denial? Do tell.”

He sets his jaw and says nothing.

“Have you ever considered what your little arrangement looks like? Or that she has accepted it without a single word of complaint?”

Y’shtola takes a few steps forward, punctuating her sentence with one pointed finger in his sternum.

“Don’t. Fuck. It. Up.”

Then she takes two steps back, flicks her tail, and leaves him in favor of the Night’s Blessed campfire.

Thancred resumes his warpath to the bar. If he’s a little ruder than strictly necessary to the throng gathered around Zoeya, well.

There _was_ a sign. They had it coming.


	6. Precipice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Thancred tests out a hypothesis and gets unexpected results.

Several weeks later, with nothing left to do besides wait for the giant Talos’ assembly, Thancred pays the bartender for two long-necked bottles and heads down the trail south of Amity. A sharp promontory juts out like a jagged knife above the plains of lower Kholusia; the two-hundred- and seventy-degree view at the point creates a beautiful panorama of the sea. There’s a series of large stones scattered along the path, perfect for hiding from casual view if one were so inclined - which, of course, he is, long since exhausted by the jittery comings and goings of people wound tight by hope and suspense. He can’t help feeling a touch optimistic himself, though something about all this success feels too neat.

Too simple.

Too easy.

It’s a deep-seated anxiety he just can’t seem to shake.

There are other restless thoughts circling inside his mind. Thoughts that worry at Y’shtola’s convictions, that turn her statements upside down and backwards, that analyze and disassemble and reassemble her conclusions as if they hold some clue to an enigma he hasn’t discovered yet. He’s been paying closer attention to Zoeya since the worst of the chaos died down; she isn’t behaving any differently than usual as far as he can tell. She treats everyone with the same respect, performs every task asked of her no matter how small, pushes herself past limits any reasonable person would set.

But she _ does _ listen to him, now, when he tells her to rest or eat. Sometimes he thinks she might be waiting on him to do so, using the limits of his tolerance as both goalpost and gauge. Other times it’s obvious she enjoys making him impatient enough to pull her away from the latest chore. She teases him good-naturedly, he fires something witty back, and she offers a bit of Rae-Lewq’s latest dish by way of apology. They sit out on the steps of the mayor’s home with Ryne, sharing the plate between them, taking turns with the fork and watching the world go by. He thanks her afterwards, and she always responds the same way:

“Anytime.”

It’s a touch domestic, of course, but nothing that would imply desire, because that’s the only reasonable conclusion he can come to - Y’shtola must believe they are physically attracted to each other. He won’t even deny it on his end (his little episode in Il Mheg put the proof to that), but he hasn’t seen any evidence of reciprocation and would never force the issue. He’s honestly insulted Y’shtola bothered warning him off. What does she think he is, an animal?

Thancred passes a particularly large stone and startles a necking elven couple. He simply raises his eyebrow and they immediately scramble for their regal purple clothes, muttering hurried apologies and bowing compulsively as they depart with all haste. He snickers wickedly under his breath and continues down the path. Maybe he should consider maintaining his menacing reputation if it keeps getting that kind of result. 

By the time he approaches the final stone closest to the point, he’s more than ready to indulge in some peace and quiet. He sighs heavily as he rounds the corner.

Zoeya looks up from her cross-legged seat, just as surprised as he, shaking her head the way she does when she scatters the fragments of a daydream. “Hi.”

“Hello yourself. I thought you were looking for the Exarch?”

“I was. I found him. He went back to town ages ago.” She sighs and looks out over the landscape. “I stayed because … it’s quiet, out here. Thought I might take the chance to get away for a while.”

“It seems we were of the same mind.”

She smiles at him and eyes the brown glass in his grip. “Dwarven stonebrew?”

“It’s an acquired taste,” he concedes as he sinks to the ground next to her. She tilts her head and bats her eyelashes excessively. He snorts and passes her one, earning a hissed “yes!” as she beams and twists off the cap.

“I helped gather the ingredients for a new batch this morning! I was so disappointed I wouldn’t get to taste it.” She raises the mouth of the bottle to her lips and takes a large swig. Her eyes bug out as she swallows and coughs.

“Too bitter?”

“You could have said something!”

“I told you it was an acquired taste,” he states blithely and presents his palm for the bottle.

She shakes her head and cradles it close to her chest. “Nuh-uh. I’ll acquire this taste if it kills me.”

“Suit yourself,” he smirks as he pops the cap off his own ale.

They sit in companionable silence for a while, watching clouds go by as they sip. She sighs contentedly next to him and bumps his shoulder with hers. “Hey.”

She’s not looking at him, but that’s alright. She smiles at the bottle like it knows all of her secrets. “Thank you. For everything – not just the beer.”

“You’re welcome.”

She looks up briefly and grins wider before dropping her gaze. It’s artless and unrefined, but he recognizes that behavior; the involuntary smiling, the tentative non-touches…

“Can I ask you something?” she requests, interrupting his thoughts.

“Go ahead.”

She fiddles with the bottle. “That day Y’shtola came by. When she said I was ‘unstable’. What did she say to you?”

“You heard that?”

“Yeah. It’s harder to fall asleep than it used to be.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Try me.”

He grins and takes another swig. He could tell her Y’shtola apologized; he could tell her they reconciled; He could let her keep frowning at her hands. He could.

“She told me you have eyes for someone.”

Zoeya goes pale as a sheet. “What?”

“She told me you’re infatuated. Smitten. Besotted.” He raises one mischievous eyebrow.

“Shut up.” She smacks his arm playfully. “Fine then. Keep your secrets.”

He chuckles at her and takes another drink. The color is high in her cheeks, but she’s smiling again and that’s all that matters. She shifts her weight to lean her shoulder against his. Thancred finds he doesn’t mind.

“While we’re on the topic of things you wouldn’t believe - you’ll never guess what I ran into on the way here.”

“Oh?” she replies with a silly half-smile. 

“Two rather _ preoccupied _Eulmorans. They nearly pissed themselves at the sight of me.”

She hides a toothy grin behind her hand. “I bet. You’re pretty good at glaring people into submission.”

“It has its uses.”

“Did you make them cry?”

“No. Though all the bowing and apologizing _ was _ quite gratifying.”

She cackles. “I am _ so _ glad that hasn’t happened to me.”

What an interesting turn of phrase. A warning bell chimes in the back of his mind but the rest of him ignores it.

“Which one?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Which one?” he presses, voice slipping into a lower register he hasn’t used in years. “Getting caught, or getting _ preoccupied _?”

Her eyes widen. “Don’t make me hurt you.”

It’s a threat without heat and they both know it. Zoeya lowers her hand and narrows her eyes. Thancred simply leans back and waits. She looks away first and takes a bracing swig from her bottle.

“Getting caught.”

“Really? Because Y’shtola seems to believe you’re pure as the driven snow.”

She snorts and takes another sip of her beer. “Y’shtola doesn’t know everything.”

He watches her swallow.

“So you have?”

“Well, okay, not like _ that _,” she says, flapping one hand dismissively, “not since… before I left Radz-at-Han.” Zoeya’s expression changes to one of idle fascination. “Huh. Maybe it has been a while.”

It seems like such an odd thing to lose track of. She speaks of sex like remembering she has a snowglobe in storage she should dust off sometime before the Starlight festival. His skepticism must show on his face, because she raises her hands to shoulder height and makes a short, backhanded reaching motion as she searches for her words.

“It’s not - it doesn’t work for me, like it does for everyone else. I can’t -“ she blushes under his scrutiny as she pauses, “I can’t feel _ that way _ about someone unless I know them really well. I don’t mean I have secret feelings for all my friends. I mean it’s literally a prerequisite condition.

Beautiful people are…" she taps the lip of the bottle absently against her chin while her eyes go unfocused and she contemplates. “… like abstract art to me, otherwise.”

“Useless and confusing?”

That startles a throaty laugh from her, ending in a stifled cough.

“What I was going to say,” she resumes in her most diplomatic tone, “is I can appreciate the effort, but I have no drive to pursue it.”

“So,” he repeats, “useless and confusing.”

She rolls her eyes and grins despite herself. “Don’t let Alphinaud hear you say that.”

“In that case,” he muses as he stretches one leg in out front and leans a forearm on his knee, “What doesn’t Y’shtola know?”

She flushes further. A pregnant pause hangs in the air.

“I made out with Lyse once.”

He blinks.

“Are you serious?”

“Yes, I’m serious. It was horrible. Zero out of ten, would not recommend.”

“That traumatic?” he manages, fighting to keep a straight face.

“She wields her tongue like a weapon! It felt like she was trying to choke me, but from the inside!”

Thancred laughs out loud.

“Don’t get me started on the teeth,” Zoeya grumbles as she hides her face in her hands.

He bends over his knee and pinches the bridge of his nose, absolutely shaking with mirth. He’s simultaneously relieved and disappointed; both at ease and bereft. A simple matter of having the wrong parts. That’s all there is to it.

Nothing for it, then. He salutes her with his bottle, ready to deliver some witty rejoinder –

But her legs are drawn up in front of her, forearms crossed over her knees, beer dangling from her right hand as her shoulders lean back against the stone. Her smile is warm; her gaze, soft -

And there it is: the brief flicker to his mouth and back again.

He eases back against the rock. “You know, it’s supposed to be easy.”

She huffs wryly. “I guess I’m not that lucky.”

The sea breeze ruffles her hair, and he spots his opportunity: a bit of plant detritus tangled in the strands at her nape. Slowly, ever so slowly, he raises his left hand and fingers a ringlet hanging over her collarbone. Her eyes follow the motion but she doesn’t pull away.

“You have something in your hair.” He rubs the soft tendril between the pads of his fingers. “May I?”

“Uh… yeah.” She blinks rapidly before she shifts and tilts her head towards him. “Go for it.”

He gently pushes away the curls hanging at the back of her neck. His fingers skim over her shirt, along her shoulder blade and up her spine, pausing to outline where scales and flushed skin meet at the base of her hairline. Goosebumps rise under his touch. She inhales quickly and holds her breath.

Now isn’t_ that _something.

It would be so simple to reach out and pull her closer. Gods, it would be easy, so very _ easy _ to lower his mouth to hers and teach her how sensual a kiss can be; to make her hum and sigh and fall into his arms; to name the terrifying, humbling, quiet something that revels in her happiness and fights to keep her safe.

Too simple.

Too easy.

_ Don’t start something if you cannot finish it. _

The neglected warning chime crescendos to a deafening roar. All of his restless thoughts slide home at once; and as the chasm breaks open and yawns beneath his feet, Thancred lifts his hand.

_ It is not for you. _

“There,” he murmurs, plucking the debris from her hair. “All done."

She turns halfway towards him before she stops and exhales. His heart thumps double-time in his chest. He twirls the dried leaf by the stem and holds it in her field of vision in a vain effort to retain his composure. She looks up into his eyes and it takes everything in him not to lean forward and finish what he started.

Gods help him. When did this happen?

He touches the fragile leaf to her parted lips. “I think this is yours.”

“Thanks,” she whispers, warm breath fluttering against his fingertips.

“Anytime.”

And before he can think too much about why he echoed the one word she saves just for him, he drops it into her hand, gets up, and staggers away.


	7. Honesty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Thancred accepts a simple truth.

She falls.

She told him. She told him this would happen. He hadn’t believed it, somehow convinced she would pull through just as she always has: yet here she is, writhing on her knees, coughing up luminescent bile and blazing white with the excess of aether warping her body. Just one more infected sinner, wheezing her last breaths, another hopeless victim subjected to a fate worse than death.

Mortal.

He can hear the fracturing of her soul – a sickening sound, like glass shattering underfoot – and he fights the urge to retch at the horror of it.

_I will never let you become an Eater._

Thancred reaches for his blade.

The Exarch arrives. Where his friends percieve treachery, Thancred instead sees something eerily familiar. He recognizes the mark of an Archon when the ever-present hood falls back; he knows far more intimately the devastation on his face when she calls him by his name. Thancred bears no ill will towards the steward of the Crystal Tower, but if sacrificing G’raha Tia’s life will save hers…

He stays his hand.

Then a pool of dark aether swells in his peripheral vision, and he opens his mouth -

It’s already too late.

Emet-Selch prowls next to the bleeding Exarch, taunting Zoeya with his smoking gun, scorning her every effort in light of their utter failure to protect her. Even battered and broken, Zoeya names the bastard for what he is: the ruthless monster who created Vauthry, an innocent babe twisted beyond recognition by fusion with a Warden in utero.

Alphinaud, ever naïve, cannot fathom how the Ascian could lie to him with the truth.

Thancred knew Lahabrea. He can never forget.

When she finally collapses and the demon leaves them with one final taunt, Ryne and the twins immediately rush to her side. Ryne pours everything she has into quelling the Light while the other four Scions funnel her their untainted aether. It’s not long before even their combined reserves sputter and run dry. He watches Zoeya convulse, helpless to defend her from the onslaught, and he prays silently to every one of the Twelve:

_Spare her - take me instead - not again_ \- _I beg of you – please - _

She shudders one final time as her raging aether falls quiet.

He forgets how to breathe.

Ryne crumples to the ground.

Stampeding aurochs couldn’t keep him from running to her side. He lifts his little girl by the shoulders and checks her breathing: alive and conscious, thank the Gods, but exhausted and unable to stand. Urianger’s shoulders sag; Y’shtola pants over her knees; Alisaie and Alphinaud wrap their arms around each other’s shoulders, upright only by virtue of their combined effort.

Thancred turns back to Ryne. She manages to paste on a smile.

“She’s alive.”

*~*

Thancred carries Zoeya down the mountain. He cradles her limp body like a priceless treasure.

If anyone were to ask him, he would explain that he was the strongest one left. It’s only logical.

No one asks.

*~*

By the time they reach the Talos his muscles are burning and his comrades, stumbling. The colossus itself is as tall as any peak; he grits his teeth in anticipation of the pain. From this vantage point he can see the Fae harrying the last of the Sin Eater host - Feo Ul cackles nearby, delighting in the carnage.

Feo Ul.

“Feo Ul!”

Thancred staggers to the edge of the Talos’ immense hand and screams again. “Feo Ul!”

“Thancred?” Y’shtola inquires uncertainly, but Urianger lurches forward and halts beside him, understanding dawning on his face as he bellows something long and flowery in Fae.

Feo Ul doesn’t hear him - but the closest pixie does, and it immediately beelines for Urianger, bobbing and weaving in agitated patterns as he hurriedly relays the situation. The pixie looks thoughtfully at Thancred, then zips over to examine the burden he carries; it rears back, frightened, and tears off at speed for its mercurial King.

“The bond,” Alphinaud breathes. “You’re invoking the bond for aid on her behalf.”

“Aye,” Urianger assents. “We can but pray mine meager petition is enough.”

It seems an age before Feo Ul’s distant form bends its ear. Then they raise their scepter, light the globe in the center, and call out in the language of the pixies.

“Gods be praised,” Urianger chants as Thancred falls to his knees.

Within minutes a cadre of amaro circle towards them, Seto himself at the formation’s center.

*~*

It has been two weeks.

Two weeks of watching and waiting. Two weeks of taking shifts with the nurses of Spagyrics for vigils by her bed. Two weeks of no constructive news - not from Kholusia, Ahm Araeng, Rak’tika or Il Mheg.

Arcane research has never been Thancred’s strong suit. He and Ryne are doing their best, but even with Moren’s people helping them scour the Cabinet, the volume of magical texts to sift through is truly incredible. He has been drowning in pedantic verbiage and obscure technical jargon until he hardly knows up from down. Three days ago he finally snapped and sent a rudely worded request for help to Urianger via moogle courier. He wouldn’t be surprised if the man burned it, to be honest.

Every day Thancred sits in the same wooden chair at her side. The chirurgeons give him what report they can. Sometimes her vital signs are promising.

Sometimes they are not.

Thancred watches the clock like a hawk and rotates her limp body from her back to her side every two hours. The very idea of bed sores is something he simply will not allow. He calls the orderlies when he detects the distinctive odor of excrement; he steps out to preserve her modesty while they change her linens and bathe her fragile skin. Then he thanks them, combs her hair away from her face, and braids her wine-red curls over her shoulder.

He has no idea if she can hear him, but he talks to her anyway. He can only pray she isn’t sick of the sound of his voice.

*~*

“There are no words sufficient to make amends for the wounds mine actions have inflicted. Time and time again, it is thee who sufferest most when the ill-begotten fruit of mine duplicities ripens on the vine. I swear to thee, Twelve smite me if I dare speak false - such grievous injury has never been mine intent.”

Urianger kneels and hangs his head. “I have no right to entreat thee for mercy. I am but an audacious supplicant, begging for absolution I know all too well I do not deserve.

Forgive me, my friend.”

Thancred looks away and to the bed beside him. The shallow rise and fall of her chest is barely perceptible beneath the sheets.

“How long have you known?”

Urianger’s measured response is layered in contrition and depth of meaning.

“From the very beginning.”

He doesn’t know why he expects any different.

Where rage and seething resentment would have festered before, Thancred only finds exhaustion. The ever-present undercurrent of pain he has grown so accustomed to tastes bitter on his tongue. That bitterness sparks a memory, of green eyes and smiles and ale, and he wonders what she would say, what she would do if she were in his place.

Thancred lets their conversation die in the silence. He spends several long minutes counting her breaths, waiting for the next exhale to be her last. Her skin is pale and cold; her pulse, sluggish and weak. Yet her heart still beats, still resists, still pushes the tide of viscous quietude moving like toxic sludge through her veins.

He knows all her favorite foods, he realizes. He swallows against his rising bile.

“If she wakes… ask me again.”

It is all that he can spare.

Urianger rises and quietly exits the room.

*~*

It takes a pointed consult from Chessamile herself before Thancred admits he needs to take a break.

He and Ryne are sitting on the edge of Sullen’s ancient wooden pier, casting their borrowed lines aimlessly into the placid lake. They don’t talk much. The lap of the water against his bare feet is soothing; it would be a pretty spot to watch the sunset – if there was one.

It seems like something Zoeya might like.

Ryne reels in her latest specimen, a tiny silver carp three ilms long. She lets out a disappointed _tch_ and throws it back.

“We’re out of bait,” he muses.

She sighs. “I’ll go get some more.”

She picks up the pail and pads away. He reels in his line – nothing – and watches the wind on the water as he waits for her return.

Several minutes later, Ryne’s rapid footfalls come thundering back down the moldy planks.

“Thancred! Thancred!”

The mix of alarm and relief in her cries can only mean one thing.

He abandons his pole on the dock.

*~*

He loves her.

He loves her as she stands upright on her own two feet. He loves the resolve burning in her eyes. He loves the way she worries for their safety; he loves her bashful smile as she addresses the crowd; He loves the way she walks, the way she talks, the way she breathes.

It’s both overwhelming and comforting, being so honest with himself. He can barely speak in her presence for fear of giving himself away.

He loves her, and no matter where she goes – from the highest peak to the darkest depths of the ocean – he will follow.

It’s as simple as that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the wait guys - this was a really difficult chapter to write. It should be the last major dose of angst, I promise!


	8. Flame

Zoeya seems changed when she comes back to the Tempest from her trip to the surface.

She is already watching the Ondo ceremony when he and the other Scions catch up to her. The enormous lamp flickers and glows as if a spirit were trapped inside while their shaman offers his thanks and prayers. Thancred could have sworn Zoeya was speaking to someone before they arrived, but no one else is there; she turns around suddenly and her face lights up, almost as if he had called her name.

Where she would have scoffed playfully and rolled her eyes at his teasing compliments before, instead she simply holds his gaze and smiles. It seems… wistful. Perhaps a little hopeful. The barest hint of a rosy tint suffuses her pallid cheeks.

From then on he keeps feeling her eyes on him. If it were anyone else he would be irritated at the sensation, but he can’t be cross with her when his are on her just as often. She watches with concern and asks him to be careful going down into the Caliban Gorge. Twice she begins to reach out for his hand only to abort the movement half-way. He has never seen her be so hesitant about offering a simple touch before.

The third time he catches her smaller hand in his own.

“Thank you,” he murmurs before he squeezes her fingers.

Her smile is small and melancholy when she squeezes back. “Anytime.”

*~*

They rest for the last time just outside the enchanted city.

There is a small cave carved into the sediment of the ocean floor; it provides some minor reprieve from the oppressive glow of thousands of ethereal lights. The Scions go about the work of making camp with quiet efficiency, laying out sleeping bags and passing salted meat around for their supper. It isn’t long before Y’shtola and Urianger are arguing heatedly about the intricacies of maintaining large-scale glamours. Ryne listens attentively while Alphinaud interjects any time he sees an opening. Alisaie groans, turns away, and covers her ears with her blanket.

Ordinarily, Zoeya would be paying half-attention, waiting patiently to speak while busying her hands with one task or another. This time she stays quiet, hands folded loosely in her lap, gaze half-lidded and thoughts malms away. He catches her eye across the fire. The flames flicker over her pale lips, curved just barely upwards in the ghost of a smile. He waits for her to fidget, to make a terrible joke, to try and draw him into their conversation just like she always has.

Instead, she traces his form with her faraway gaze. There is a subtle, pained intensity in her expression as her eyes roam over his arms and shoulders. He feels her careful regard even underneath his armor, a featherlight touch that trails over his waist and abdomen before rising to tentatively outline his jaw. Her curious eyes study his cheekbones, the arch of his brow, the bridge of his nose. His heart pounds in his chest as he watches her commit the shape of his lips to memory.

Then she offers him a sad imitation of a smile, picks up her grimoire, and walks away to take in the cityscape.

In his dreams he sinks his hands into her hair and kisses her until she giggles and sighs. He tastes the salt on her skin, makes her writhe until she moans his name, takes his sweet time with her body until she cries out and falls apart under his tongue.

He wakes burning.

*~*

This is it.

The firey gates lie open before them. Emet-Selch strolls into the doom of his world with one final snarl. Zoeya watches him go, eyes full of pity and determination as she straightens her shoulders and steps forward.

She speaks to each of the Scions in turn, confirming their choice to follow her into the Ascian’s personal facsimile of hell. When she comes to him he notices the others conspicuously turn away and walk towards the entrance. She offers him that same world-weary smile.

“Hi.”

“Hello yourself.”

They stand in awkward silence for a moment.

“Take a walk with me?” she murmurs.

He nods and follows her lead. They don’t go far, stopping just outside the Capitol building and ducking behind a stone pillar where they cannot easily be seen from inside.

“So…” she trails off, fidgeting aimlessly with her bracelet. “Are you sure you want to be here?”

“I follow you to the bottom of the ocean on a flying fae whale, do countless godsdamned chores for the Ondo, reconnoiter an ancient city for you, and now you ask if I’d like to come along?”

Her lips twitch upwards in wry amusement. “Point taken.”

“Is there a reason you needed to confirm this with me this out of sight?”

She shifts her weight back and forth before she leans back against the column and lets out a sigh. “Yes. Though I don’t think you’ll thank me for it.”

“Zoeya. I cannot thank you enough for everything you have done. For me, for Ryne - and for Minfilia.”

She waves him off. “I’m not fishing for compliments. I would have done it no matter what. You’re my - ” she stops mid-sentence and reconsiders her words. Her fingers grasp at something non-existent by her sides before she stuffs them in her pockets.

“Thancred, I want you to understand: you don’t owe me for any of it. There are no guarantees any one of us will make it out of that hellhole alive. Ryne has done everything she can for me. If I…” She takes a deep breath. “If I don’t make it...”

She was right. He does not like where this conversation is going.

“Ryne will need you more than ever if that outcome becomes reality. The First can’t afford to lose both the Oracle and their only known native with the Echo. I know it might be difficult to get back to the surface, but if Grenoldt could find his way out here, I’m sure there must be a way - ”

“To do what? Twiddle our thumbs while you perish?”

“It’s better than dragging you both to an early grave.”

“What of the others? Would you have them fight on without us?”

“Yes.”

“I refuse.”

“Thancred, think about this, you and Ryne are too important –“

His voice is quiet yet firm as he takes a slow step towards her.

“You think I fight because I owe you?”

Her eyes widen as he takes another step.

“You think I stand before you now out of some warped sense of obligation?”

“No, that’s not what I –“

He grips her shoulders firmly and looks her straight in the eye.

“Your battles are  _ my _ battles. Your fight is  _ my _ fight. I have your back and you have mine. Remember?”

“Yeah,” she replies breathlessly. “I remember.”

“Do you? Because you’ve been behaving as if you’ve already lost me since the day you woke.”

He didn’t know it until he said it out loud, but suddenly it makes sense: the reluctance to touch him, the wistful stares, this bizarre attempt to send him away when her need is most dire.

“Did you really believe there was any chance in hell I would accept such a ludicrous offer?”

She presses her lips together and looks down. Her hands rise to tentatively rest on his forearms.

“Why would you even consider asking me such a thing? You must know there is no protecting us from this.”

“I had to try.”

“Why?”

She opens and closes her mouth several times while her eyes fill with unshed tears. Then finally, soft as a whisper:

“You’re my family.”

His heartbeat stutters in his chest.

“Then  _ rely on us _ . Let us fight at your side. Believe me when I tell you there is no place I would rather be.”

“Even if I turn? Even if I take you down with me?”

“I am well aware of the risks, Zoeya.”

“How am I supposed to live with that?!” She hisses, expression tight with anguish as two tears roll down her face. “You –  _ both  _ of you - mean too much to me.”

Tears. Tears, from her, for  _ him _ –

Gods, this woman. Her very existence is going to break him.

“Zoeya,” he breathes, voice heavy with restrained emotion. “I need you to listen carefully. I will only say this once. Understand?”

She nods curtly. His right hand gently glides over her collarbone and up her neck to cup her chin. He hears her breath hitch as he leans close and murmurs quietly into the flat of her left horn.

“As sure as I am your family, you are also mine.”

Zoeya doesn’t speak. She simply stares in quiet awe as Thancred eases back enough to meet her wide-eyed gaze. His heart jumps painfully against his ribs.

“I am no expert on the subject, but… where you go, I will follow. When you falter, I will be there to offer my blade. I am sure Ryne feels the same,” he mutters as he wipes her tear tracks with his thumb. His hand returns to her shoulder and he takes a deliberate step back. “Do I make myself clear?”

He watches her blink slowly as she intently searches his face.

“Yes fighting, no running?”

“Yes fighting. No running.”

Then she smiles. Truly, genuinely smiles: a sweet, fond curve of her lips that reaches all the way to her watery eyes. She idly taps his left bicep with the side of her fist before she wipes her eyes with the other. He can see the resolve kindling in her gaze as she schools her expression and takes a fortifying breath.

“Okay.”

“Are you ready now?”

Yeah. Let’s do it.” She grabs his arm and squeezes. “Together.”

*~*

There is nothing left.

Zoeya is bent in half, the Light breaking free once more, struggling with all her might to take one more step. Emet-Selch mocks her every attempt. She stumbles and falls, pulling herself towards her foe on her elbows and knees, refusing to surrender until her very last breath as her skin glows a sickly white.

Ryne lies battered and bruised behind her, arm outstretched, her last hope thwarted with a flick of the Ascians’ finger like so much useless refuse. Alphinaud lies prone over Alisaie’s body; Urianger and Y’shtola are barely breathing; Thancred knows his left arm is dislocated underneath him, but it’s too difficult to pinpoint anything else through the dizzying fog of pain enveloping his mind.

His gunblade lies useless at the edge of his reach. He struggles to  _ move, gods damn it _ , _ she needs you, move _ –

Zoeya’s entire being erupts in a pillar of Light.

No.

No, no no no,  _ he promised _ , no –

She rises.

Zoeya speaks to Emet-Selch with a voice not her own. The Exarch appears, summoning seven more pillars around her; seven heroes from across space and time manifest within. The Ascian cowers and panics, contorting into a masked abomination the likes of which Thancred has never seen, and as Zoeya leads her compatriots into an echo of the primordial clash of Light against Dark, a bloodied G’raha Tia rushes to the Scions’ aid.

“Up, my friends,” he calls as the familiar tingle of healing magics washes over them. “You are not done yet!”

Urianger stirs first. Thancred watches as he lurches towards Alphinaud, restoring the other healer to life before stretching a hand in his direction. In a matter of moments his thoughts clear. He grits his teeth through the pain as his shoulder snaps back into place.

“Ryne,” he gasps out, but the Exarch is already there, pouring the last of his aether into her frail body. She rises to her knees and he falls to his. Within minutes both Alisaie and Y’shtola are restored as well.

“Urianger,” Y’shtola snaps, “do you still have it?”

He withdraws the white auracite from his robes in answer.

“Good. We will have need of it.”

“Shouldn’t we go out there and help her?” Ryne insists. “We can’t let her do this alone!”

“Does she look alone to you?!” Alisaie yells over the din as she lifts the Exarch to his feet, intense gusts of spent aether buffeting her from the battle behind them. “Trust me, she is not spent yet. There is one ace yet up her sleeve.”

“An ace?” Alphinaud repeats, before his eyes go wide with realization. “You gave her our blessing?! You know she cannot sustain that!”

“She doesn’t need to,” Y’shtola interjects. “She need only invoke it the once.  _ That _ will be our opening.” She snatches the crystal from Urianger and forces it into Thancred’s hand. “I trust you know what to do with this?”

“I’m certain I can figure something out. On what signal?”

Urianger grips his arm. “It will be unmistakable, my friend. Make thyself ready.”

The vicious battle draws towards its end. Hades’ mutated form shudders under the combined onslaught. Zoeya’s fellows fade and flicker; she savagely rips a sheet out of the back of her grimoire as Bahamut-Egi delivers its final blow and her aethereal companions dissipate. The page smolders and sparks into flame while she screams an incantation into the void.

An unearthly shriek of rebellion answers, her familiar’s aether swelling until it bursts, enormous blazing wings outstretched in defiance as a blinding conflagration of purifying fire descends:

Phoenix.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I went through like... four drafts? Yeah, four before I was happy enough to post this. Thanks so much to the kind commenters from last chapter, your encouragement really keeps me going. Major kudos to my beta plant_murderer too for being so patient!
> 
> For anyone confused about the end of the chapter, this wiki article should be enlightening: https://finalfantasy.fandom.com/wiki/Louisoix_Leveilleur


	9. Reversal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thancred’s POV during the events of risk communication, chapter 1. Might be best to read it second. https://archiveofourown.org/works/19744477/chapters/46731841 
> 
> When Zoeya closes her door behind them, Thancred knows this has been a long time coming.

The entire population of the Crystarium welcomes them home.

Fireworks burst overhead; street vendors sell festival food and handheld sparklers; children run laughing through the streets as their parents cheer and toast the Warrior of Darkness. Ryne and the twins eagerly explore the impromptu festivities, finally acting like the teenagers they are for once. After the third round of funnel cakes Alphinaud taps out, one arm slung over each of their shoulders and sagging like a sack of popotoes even as he tries and fails to rally. Thancred chuckles and gives a nod of approval when Ryne begs him for permission to sleep over. She and Alisaie chatter animatedly about everything and nothing while they drag the exhausted young man off to bed.

Thancred hasn’t seen Y’shtola since she was mobbed by Runar and the Night’s Blessed and quite literally carried off – despite her every protest - to gods know where. Urianger and the Exarch are bafflingly discussing the complicated theoretical underpinnings of Amaurot’s construction  _ for the fun of it _ , so he hastily excuses himself and departs the Exedra in pursuit of more stimulating company. Everywhere he goes someone pats him on the back or raises a glass in his direction. Thancred does his best to be curt but polite and keep his head down as he weaves through the Musica Universalis, searching for a telltale flash of wine-red hair and pale horns in the crowd.

Selene bobs and weaves in the air as it leads a giggling, grasping gaggle of small children on a merry chase around the Quadvirum. He follows its trail and finds Zoeya at the top of the Wandering Stairs, lifting a dwarven woman bodily off her barstool and spinning in circles while the brunette laughs uproariously. Glynard pours her a shot of top shelf liquor and declares the next round on the house; Zoeya’s diminutive companion cheers louder than anyone else and throws it back like a champ while she grimaces and forces the drink down. Her cheeks are rosy, her eyes bright and full of life, and he watches with a smile on his face while she relaxes into her seat and truly, honestly enjoys herself for once.

The noise in the bar is deafening as Thancred gradually makes his way through the crushing throng towards her. She idly brushes her curls over one shoulder and turns to speak to a brown-skinned, blond Hume archer on her left. The man lounges against the bar, skeptically eying his intended trajectory. Thancred reads his lips as he turns to Zoeya and mouths  _ you know this sinner? _

Zoeya tilts her head in that way she does when she doesn’t understand.  _ Who? _

The archer makes a lazy gesture in his general direction.  _ Long white jacket? Funny-looking blade?  _ and mimes reaching over his own shoulder to where Thancred carries his weapon.

The change in her demeanor is instantaneous. She sits up straight, scanning the crowd –

And when her eyes meet his, he could swear the cacophony surrounding them falls silent.

Zoeya only breaks eye contact when the dwarf punches her hard in the shoulder. She winces and whirls back around to upbraid her companion while the brunette brazenly appraises him. He returns the invasive scrutiny with an impassive stare of his own. Zoeya turns her back and sets her shoulders, but he doesn’t need to read her lips to know that tentative way she rubs her hand over her sore arm and steals glances at him out of the corner of her eye.

She felt it too, then.

Thancred gradually comes to a stop and puts his hands in his pockets. He deliberately leaves his posture easy and open while he backs away and leans against the railing at the top of the stairs. Minutes pass. Patrons laugh and traffic swirls. Zoeya braces her hands on the countertop and takes a deep breath.

Then she slides off her barstool, says her goodbyes, and comes straight to him.

*~*

When Zoeya closes her door behind them, Thancred knows this has been a long time coming.

Nowhere to be. No one to save. No one else in the room but two of them. Nothing left to do besides put paid to their long-simmering attraction. 

He turns to look at her over his shoulder, taking one long moment to simply drink her in, tracing her body with his eyes the way she did his last night over the fire. Zoeya flushes all the way down her neck to her scales.

“Thancred?”

Her voice is timid and unsure, nerves writ plain on her face.

*~*

This is –

This is not a consummation. It’s a  _ confession. _

A drunken confession, at that.

Gods fucking damn it. He’s gone and let his own lust and desires get ahead of him. He should have noticed how her walk was swaying long before she sat down – long before he  _ followed her to her room _ – and pulled off his glove with trembling fingers. He feels like the absolute scum of the earth when she takes his hand in hers and laces their fingers together, quietly begging him for a chance.

“I know you’re not ready. I know you’re not over her yet – Minfilia, I mean. But when you’re ready, I’d like to start something new. With you. If you want to.”

He wants to hold her. He wants to kiss her senseless. He wants to wordlessly show her all the ways he yearns for her and her alone, but the pungent scent of alcohol on her breath as she beholds him with those beautiful, vulnerable, trusting green eyes keeps his entire body frozen in place.

Is this some sort of cosmic justice? Is this divine retribution for all the innocent girls he loved and left in his youth, all the marks he seduced in pursuit of arbitrary objectives on the Source? If so it’s excruciatingly effective. 

She’s still waiting.

With no other way to protect himself, Thancred settles for blatant honesty. 

“This is the last thing that I expected when you asked me to come up to your chambers.”

Zoeya recoils immediately and drops his hand. 

“I… see. You were under the impression I um… wanted something else from you.”

“Quite.”

He can see the injury inflicted by his misjudgment in the way her entire posture crumples inwards. She turns away and blinks quickly.

“Sorry I gave you the wrong impression. It won’t happen again.”

She gets up and staggers to the window, opening it and staring out into the night while she clasps her hands behind her in a white knuckled grip.

Seven hells. A punch in the face would have been better than watching her run wounded from his presence.

What in the hells had possessed him? Why couldn’t he just tell her what she needs to hear? The fucking Exarch has declared his undying devotion with no guarantee of reciprocation, and he can’t find the balls to tell her how desperately he loves her when she lays the rare honor of her fragile heart at his feet?

She deserves so much better than this. So much better than him.

Thancred feels strangely hollow as he stands up. He slings his blade across his back and takes two heavy steps towards the door. He begins to reach for the handle, turning to commit her form to memory one last time –

And watches her ribcage shudder as she silently fights back a sob.

Tears. Tears he caused.

_ Again. _

He can’t leave her like this.

Slowly, carefully, Thancred joins her at the window, crosses his arms, and gazes out at the stars.

He can see her just at the edge of his peripheral vision. The noise from the celebrating city below ebbs and flows. Her harsh, uneven breathing gradually calms to a more normal rhythm. He can’t bring himself to face her straight on, looking down and away while he shifts his weight.

“It’s not what I expected, but I didn’t say I was opposed to the idea.”

It’s such a mealy-mouthed, roundabout, coward’s way of putting it. She turns to him anyway.

“I am familiar with physicality. I might be a bit out of practice, but I’m confident enough in that department. I am… not as skilled in other matters. As you well know.”

He turns his head just enough to gauge her reaction; the unfettered hope shining in her eyes is all the motivation he needs to keep stumbling forward.

"I respect you as a fellow Scion above all else.”

_ Please, do continue wooing her with your professional esteem _ , his inner voice sneers.  _ Out with it, you blithering idiot! _

That said…" Thancred swallows, mouth and throat suddenly dry, heart fit to pound out of his chest. Gods damn it. She had better fucking remember this in the morning.

"I would be lying if I said I've never had thoughts about you. I wouldn't be here otherwise."

Zoeya reaches out and pulls the window panes shut. 

*~*

Thancred quietly closes her door behind him.

She is safe, happy, sleeping off her inebriation fully clothed and alone. Should he have tugged off her boots before he put her to bed? Perhaps. But all he had been able to think about in the moment was how fervently he wished to kiss her, and staying close while she was so warm and pliant and willing could easily have broken his resolve.

Subtle flirtations, teasing glances, terrible lines that made her laugh – he feels intoxicated just from being near her, as if each glass of water he poured was nothing but the sweetest wine. Gods, the way she smiled at him when she said:

_ You’ve been paying attention to what makes me happy? _

Even drunk off her ass and shaking like a leaf, her mind is sharp enough to catch casual lapses in his phrasing and suss out the meaning between. Because she knows him, and he knows her; and he wonders idly if that’s why it all felt so easy and inevitable once he finally let himself step off the edge.

Is this what the all the songs have been on about? He’d always believed they were simple social grandstanding - convenient, flowery exaggerations created to disguise mutual lust in public. It’s certainly how he’d deployed them back in his younger days. Absolutely nothing remotely scandalous occurred behind that locked door, yet somehow all he can think about is the lovesick grin on her face when she asked if they could talk again tomorrow.

He’d give her all of his tomorrows, if only she asked. But she doesn’t need to know that.

Thancred laughs at himself. Aren’t they too old for this? Tiptoeing around an infatuation like children? Yet as he looks at his hands, one bare and one gloved, he realizes he wouldn’t have it any other way.

Tomorrow. They will talk again tomorrow.

For her, he can wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright everyone! We have officially merged timelines with risk communication! 
> 
> I still have a couple chapters for this fic planned, but they'll be reaction chapters to the actual progress happening in risk communication. I hope you'll look forward to more updates on these two from Zoeya's POV.
> 
> Also... 100 kudos??? I don't know how to thank you all for your support, especially TheDivineMissBlue and plant_murderer for their lovely words of encouragement and beta-ing skills. Thanks for joining me on this wonderful ride. :)


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